Reptile & Amphibian Forums

I know earlier this month i believe I posted something about breeding Cal Kings. Well I went on to checking out other things(meaning no male) but now I've decided to stick to breeding Calis for the first time. My female is a normal black and white banded beauty. What kind of Cal King male morph should I get? Is there anything very popular on the market right now in Cal King morphs?

You have to think about the offspring you'll get get from your black and white banded female and whatever type of male you get. Albinos are always very popular, but if you get an albino male all of the offspring will be normal looking hets. If you get a striped male, you will probably get all abberant pattern offspring (I like abberants!).

Those black and white banded genes from the female will make up half of the genetics of the offspring no matter what you do. You are probably best off getting a black and white banded (desert phase) male to make more of the same, or some other black and white morph male to make abberants.

Hopefully Kerby Ross, the forum's Cal King guru may answer your question, but I haven't seen him post recently.

Good luck,

Greg

Yes I understand that I'd get all normal looking hets. But if I breed her to an albino striped male, I get aberrant hatchlings that'd be het for albino. Then I could hold one or two hatchlings back and breed them to the father and get albinos that could be aberrant striped or banded!

You're absolutely right. If you got an albino male and produced hets, then bred them back to the father you would get roughly 50% hets and 50% albinos. Question is, do you want to wait that long to get what you want? You could get a pair of breeding age animals right now and produce exactly what you want next year. Cal-Kings, even albinos, are fairly inexpensive.

Good luck

You are not going to profit from breeding California Kings.
The market is so saturated - they breed too easily.

It's better IMHO to get a mate for your snake that is what you would like and enjoy as a pet.

Even if you spend a lot of money and get some new rare morph, it will probably only be highly marketable for a few years, Cal Kings just breed to easily and too many people breed them.

So get a mate for your snake that tickles your fancy.
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3.0 WC; 0.1 CB L. getula californiae
0.1 CB L. pyromelana pyromelana
0.1 WC; 10 eggs (7/11) Elgaria multicarinata multicarinata

I'll just say this: Kathy Love profits from breeding corn snakes. I don't plan on becoming a big shot breeder like her though, at least not yet haha. I just wanna get this whole breeding thing down because I haven't bred anything yet in my life, and I'm 18 and I'm frustrated that I haven't lol.